Alio
by Areale
Summary: How we longed for heavenwe're letting go of something we never had. A challenge given by Daelan whose work I'd encourage you to read :D because I was in danger of losing the ability to write fiction. A little HD but not even near explicit.


"Daddy, who's that?" The little tug on his hand made him look down at her. Iona was staring very hard at something across the room, her little brows slightly puckered, her mouth twisted in thought. Only five and already a beautiful replica of her mother. "I think he knows you, daddy."

He smiled at her slightly to reassure her - a fact he later thought was bitterly ironic - and then glanced up and across the bookstore.

His stomach, heart and lungs reacted simultaneously. "Oh my god," he whispered, "he's back," and then felt instantly idiotic.

The green eyes burned at him across shelves of books. The cheekbones were painful planes across the expanse of his skin - slightly tanned - and his cheeks seemed entirely stripped of flesh. The hard lines of his shoulders were tense under the shabby cloak. He stood as if he cared about nothing, had cared about nothing, except this moment of their meeting.

It was ridiculous. Draco, rescuing himself from torturous half-memory, half-dream, knew that it was _he, _Draco, who'd been the romantic - the one with the sense of irony and the past - which so often spilled into the present - the sense of futility, the desperation, while Harry had been beautifully awkward, honest, and all the rest of it, but without the bitterness.

Which conclusion was foolish in itself, because he had never known Harry in that way, had he. It had never happened.

Harry moved towards him. It was an abrupt, decisive motion, the cloak pulling apart to reveal a worn sweater and jeans underneath. The incongruity of it with Harry's expression stopped him from fleeing.

Harry stopped three feet away. "Hello, Malfoy."

Something around Draco's chest tightened and wept, a little. Very evenly - "Potter. Hello."

Iona was no longer anxious - men who greeted each other civilly couldn't possibly intend to hex each other into next week. Another of Daddy's old friends, that was all. She was instantly bored. "Dad_dy_... can we go soon?" she said, in a piercing whisper. Draco looked down so that he would miss the flicker in Harry's eyes. "Certainly, darling. Now, if you like. Potter-" a little inclination of the head. He turned, without giving him the chance to respond, and moved, trembling, but swiftly, out into the sunshine of Diagon Alley, where his daughter began talking enthusiastically of sundaes.

It occurred to him only later, much later, that he had behaved like his father. Harry had killed him.

"I'll be going out for a little while," said Draco later on, depositing Iona on their worn sofa and letting Susan kiss him and take his cloak.

He saw her eyes immediately darken. "It's not-"

"It's nothing," he said, much too quickly. "I..." The problem was that Susan knew. She knew everything, was rather famous for it - not for nothing was she the niece of Amelia Bones, said most the wizarding villagers. _Do you know who they are? Fought in the Final War, they did. And he, already halfway to taking the Mark - she rescued him... _

Susan had not rescued him. He was grateful for that. She had simply agreed to marry him and live in an out of the way place, which in the end hadn't been entirely judicious, as the villagers all seemed to know everyone and their cats.

"Susan, I will be coming back," he said quietly, speaking to the cloak sleeve, and knew immediately that she would guess. There was a sudden silence filled with knowing.

Then she moved away from him. "You'd better be," and her tones were almost entirely hers, warm and dry and sweet. "I'm trying a new recipe today, entirely without magic, so if you're not going to be around to help you'd better express admiration loudly, no matter what the result."

He looked up and smiled at her, and was suddenly even more grateful. "I would kiss you soundly," he confided, following her to the sofa, "only Io might object."

Susan laughed, throwing her head back. "Very chaste."

The queasy twistings in his stomach had subsided a little.

He knew. He knew that Harry would know, like this quantum entanglement Hermione was always going on about while she did her Muggle degree, after the War. They would _know_. There need be no agreement. _Entanglement_. He almost laughed, passing the people in Diagon Alley again, the joyful, relaxed atmosphere that pervaded the place now. _Father, I'm entangled with a - well, with a boy - I'm sure you've met him - Harry Potter, remember, Father? _He brushed against a woman, saw her turn and felt her eyes on his, and the encounter suddenly spun him off course - _I'm sure you know him, Father, the one who used the Avada Kedavra on you without so much as a -_

The first time Harry had done it was when they were undergoing on-the-job-training, as Tonks had called it, smiling only a little because by then Lupin was neck-deep in danger all the time. The Death Eater who had crawled out from a neat - because it destroyed evidence - conflagration was barely recognisable as human, and Moody had said, shortly, "Put him out of his misery, lad." Harry was pale by the light of the flames, and he had stared, quietly, desperately, at Draco. They both knew what he was thinking - _haven't you done it before, _you, _Draco? _And Draco had reached out to take his hand - take the wand from his hand - and Harry had pulled away, straightened himself up, and he had - done it.

And then, as Draco for his turn stood staring at the corpse, Harry had reached out and covered his eyes with a hand. It had seemed, to Draco, to be the sweetest gesture anyone had ever made him.

Draco sought him out later in his room at Headquarters. Harry looked grave, and tired, and guilty, but he looked up as Draco came in and then looked down and laughed a little, shrugged. Draco had never wanted him so much as he had then. He had, equally, never been so sure that he would be rejected. Harry's smile had seemed to say, "Well here I am - joined the ranks of the Grey Ones, halfway between the Good and the Bad." Except the words would never have occurred to him. Draco felt old and wise, neither of which he knew really represented him. He had sat next to him, put an arm around Harry, let him cradle his head against the hollow between his shoulder and his arm...

And that was all. Two minutes later there had been a knock on the door, and Tonks had called them to dinner.

_That_, then. A final thing, a culmination of days and weeks of a prickly, burning, understanding between them - or rather, a non-understanding, each unable to give up completely his idea of the other.

_Look_ - Harry, frustrated, standing, swaying close to him at the base of the stairs of Grimmauld Place, late at night - _look, whatever - whatever _feelings _I might - I might've got for you - I don't like you, Draco, just remember, okay? There's been - too much, too often, and I can't - I can't wipe it all clean like this._

Draco had said, frustrated for his turn, desperately annoyed at himself for having taunted Potter before, testing him, as though he needed it - _you want me, Harry. Stop being a foo-_

Got that far before Harry nearly touched him, or nearly hit him, he'd never know what. And then that business with the Killing Curse, and Harry suddenly awoken to the fact that they were both orphans, in a sense - Harry more so because he had just realised it.

The here and now. The here and how. Tom the barman, Draco had decided long ago, was pretty near indestructible or immortal, because he was still there, with a few more lines in his wizened face. One of the survivors and the knowledge lurked behind his toothless grin.

"He's upstairs - room 14," said Tom, who was not smiling now.

Draco nodded at him and started up. For one terrible, extraordinary second he tried to believe it was all right - that there was nothing between them anymore, not the years of separation, the pain of not having their heaven, nothing - that he was going to meet him, finally. It was a sweet, false relief.

He was sitting on his back. Not with his back to the window, hands clasped behind, brooding like a big bird of prey, nothing of the sort. Sitting, shoulders hunched, rather like a chastened unwashed adolescent.

He did not glance up when Draco entered - only the blood rose to his cheeks.

And without the least preamble, or hesitation, he said, "I loved you."

Draco felt his breath catch in an audible gasp. He knew nothing of the seconds that had passed before he found himself in front of Harry, one hand on his dusty cloak, the other on the side of his cold face.

"You understand, don't you?" His whisper was a warm breath across Draco's eyes.

"That because we didn't try, didn't do it, left it to die, and now that we're settled in whatever paths we chose and we can't move, there's too much muddled between us, there's only one thing left to say and that was it existed and we weren't dreaming and weren't wrong-" Draco took a breath.

Harry smiled, covered his mouth with a hand. It was much the same smile - crooked, a beautiful awkward grace to his features. Only there was nothing in his eyes left to brighten it.

"You're much better at expressing this sort of thing than I am..." Their foreheads touched, slowly, and Draco could have sworn that the pain in his chest was the same thing that deepened the hollow in Harry's throat as he breathed in, slowly.

"These years... that I haven't been here, in Muggle London - I've been... oh, I dunno, touring I suppose you'd call it, because I was all over the world, really." He was talking, so quietly now that his lips barely moved, his breath only almost touched Draco's lips. "Couldn't escape it though... Was sitting in one of those pavement cafes in Paris, just to see what the fuss was about, and a wizarding couple came in, took one look at me, and left, looking like a pair of frightened rabbits. I tried leaving, leaving altogether and locking myself in the Muggle world, and it worked too, for a while. Then - then I had one of those breakdowns and the hotel I was staying in called in doctors and then there was a big fuss, psychiatric treatment and trying to see my identity cards and whatever - those things Muggles have, to distinguish from each other - and I had to leave, at least for a while."

He slid his head down until it was buried between Draco's shoulder and neck, but did not stop speaking.

"You know something, Draco? I'm likely richer than you are. What with all the money you spent on refurbishing - although I know you don't live there anymore, in the Manor... Ministry gave me money, much more than they need have, and Scrimgeour dropping hints about how would I like to travel, get away. They were afraid of me. You didn't look for me, and - that was good, I probably would've - done something to you too, I know that much.

"But I had to see you - just for a bit, then I'd be all right... I am now, I'm fine. I'm going away, in the morning. I don't know that I'll be back here for another few years, but I'm going to wait til things die down more, or maybe I'll hunt those who've escaped, though I don't need to, that would just be twisting it in a little more."

Draco lifted Harry's head to stare at him, a comfortable ease in the movement, as though he'd done it countless times before. "Don't do it," he said, speaking with the same tones Harry had. "Don't go - don't go destroying things, if you don't have to. Help them in the Ministry, if you want, but there's not a need for you to do it... you're all right. I was never afraid of you, only _for _you. I mean it. And - I do love you... If I had said no, if I'd turned around and walked downstairs, it would have been the end of it, for you, wouldn't it?"

Harry shrugged, made a movement with his head, looked away, but smiling. "Well, you didn't, and it wasn't, so..." He looked back at Draco and they smiled, again, at one another.

"Will you go, now?" Harry said quietly.

Draco shook his head, put both arms around him. "No. Later."

_Later _is a relative word. Draco knew this, walking down the stairs and away from the Leaky Cauldron, nodding again to Tom, who did not seem entirely surprised to see him leaving alone, and gravely. _Later_ was now, and now it was in the past, and ever particle of himself felt pulled by the reality of later, walking down the stairs, walking out through the doorway, feeling the now-and-present of Harry. He wanted it, suddenly, to be the past. Forever buried in the past, so that the pain of it was half-sweet, not the dead final regret of now.

He thought of the years ahead, the years without war, hopefully; the years with knowing about a past love, knowing it was lost. He thought of the years left for himself as a father and a husband - a good many of them - Io in school, Hogwarts, Susan and himself growing old, slowly. A weight of time, but only when you thought about it.

It was a finality, and he was glad of it. He'd had plenty of excitement - and there was euphemism at its best - and he hoped it had ended. There would be, he knew, "other Dark Lords whose very names would strike the tongue silent", which was a phrase Lupin had used a little mockingly, once long ago it seemed.

"Oy, Malfoy!"

He looked up and behind. Passing by the new semi-Muggle pub in Diagon Alley, which the more puritan of his wizarding brethren frowned on, he had also passed by a group of fellows who seemed determined to shatter the peace of the neighbourhood forever. They were an entirely cheery, nearly-drunken lot, comprising Weasley, Longbottom, Davies, Higgs, and what looked like Smith, along with a proportion of young foreign wizards.

"Drink?" called Ron, with whom Malfoy had long ago severed ties of hatred. "Or is Sue expecting you?" Susan was rather a favourite with them.

The other watched, a little quieter, a little expectant. Malfoy wasn't a bastard anymore, but sound and conversation around him still got a bit subdued.

Under his breath Draco muttered, "Oh why not?" and went to join them.

Ten minutes later, when conversation had livened completely and Draco was mellowed with a Butterbeer, Ron leaned slightly closer to him. "Is he all right?" he asked, and his tone was entirely different.

For a moment Draco allowed himself to be shocked. But it was impossible Weasley wouldn't know; his contacts all over the Ministry probably informed him of Harry's magical signature leaps through the world.

"He's all right. I went to see him."

Ron expelled a breath of air and looked away. "Was hoping you would," he muttered. "Hermione's dead worried about him. Isn't he - will he be staying?" He turned to look at Draco as he asked him the question, and Draco could see the quiet pain in his eyes.

"No. He'll need to get away for a spell... he'll likely be back in a few years but I would not look for him. I'm not sure you should-"

"What the hell do you think I've been trying to do past five years, hunt him down?" There was a scowl on Ron's amiable freckled features. "I've left him alone... I'm not a fool, Malfoy."

"I'm sorry," said Draco quietly.

Then there was a silence between them while the others quarrelled good-naturedly over the New Zealand and Australian Quidditch teams.

"Thanks," Ron said, almost in a whisper. "Would've been easy for you to stay away, what with Sue and Io. 'S not easy to face things like the past. Merlin, look at me, talking like a..." He sat back, smiled slightly at Draco.

"I didn't do it only for him."

"Thought so." Again that smile; with it another thoughtful silence.

Draco smiled at him, finally. "All right," he said, getting up. "I'm leaving. Susan has a new recipe, and I'm expected to approve it."

Ron grinned up at him. "Better hurry then. Hermione would like to emphasise that the three of you have a standing invitation to drop by and assures you her cooking is palatable." He cocked an eyebrow at Draco.

"We'll see. Goodbye, Weasley."

Ron lifted a hand in lazy farewell. "Bye, Malfoy. Take care."

It was only when Draco reached home and switched on the hall light that he realised how late it was. The clock showed nearly eleven, and Io was surely asleep, but Sue was sitting at the table with the food, head buried in her arms.

For a second Draco felt a horrible pang. Had she already decided-?

He touched her shoulder and she sighed, lifted her head off her arms and blinked at him. She had been asleep. Draco felt rather ridiculous.

Susan stretched and rubbed her eyes, and then glowered at him. "Draco, have you _any_ idea what time it is? You missed Io's sleepy story. She's rather angry at you, you know." She gave him a stern look, but her eyes were light and relieved, and her mouth was almost smiling. Draco leaned down to kiss her.

The new recipe had turned out very well.

That night Draco dreamed.

It was September, and the Hogwarts Express was bearing Io - proud, anxious, spirited Io - away to the furthest reaches of Scotland. Susan and he stood on the platform, waving, and it was empty but for them.

Out of the corner of his eyes Draco saw a figure and when he turned, he knew it was Harry, by the way he stood, relaxed, alert. Harry moved to stand next to him, and Draco felt him, acutely, hopefully, the same way he could feel Susan on his other side.

And Harry turned and looked at him, and this time there was no more bitterness.


End file.
